The Farr Family's adventure of trying to menu plan, spend less money by planning meals, buying sales,using coupons and store incentives to lower our grocery bill and to reduce trips out.
I have many other projects planned that will hopefully allow us to be more organized.
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Tonight we had Leftover Meatloaf and Tater Tot Casserole. In January I made a meatloaf recipe that made two loaves. We ate one and I froze one so I got that out of the freezer and thawed it to make this recipe. I was really skeptical when I was making it but it was really good. The kids even seemed to like it.

Friday, March 4, 2011

Today we did frozen pizza. I had every intention of doing homemade pizza tonight but I decided to try a recipe I found for homemade bagels. They were the bomb! They were not that hard to make at all and they were super yummy. I'm not sure that I'll buy store bought bagels anymore. Here's the link for the recipe.

This dinner was so easy to make and it was a very big hit at our house. The kids ate a lot of it and hubby went back for at least seconds. I think this is one of the easiest things I've made in a long time. Once again I love my Deep Covered Baker. I never would have believed that I could cook so many things in the microwave.

Tonight was a designated leftover night because I had a client meeting. Hubby and the kids had the run of the leftovers.

So for this blog post I'm going to try to tug at your heartstrings. In October 2010 my son Ryan was diagnosed with PDD-NOS which is an Autism Spectrum Disorder. We're now having intensive therapies at our home five days a week. I feel like someone installed a revolving door on our front porch. It's really hard to have your life invaded like this but I know it's what is going to be best for my son. I am planning to participate in the Greater Pittsburgh Walk Now for Autism Speaks in June. I pledged as a team captain to have a team of 10 and to raise $1000 as a team. I am attaching the link to our team page. If you'd like to walk with us please join our team. If you feel moved to make a donation you can do it through the link. I am also doing various fundraisers. A friend who is a Mary Kay Consultant is doing an ongoing fundraiser for our team.

I haven't been sticking to the menu very well over the last couple of weeks because I just couldn't seem to get to the grocery store. Between appointments and illness I kept putting it off. I got to the point that I was piecing meals together and not getting really great results so I had to go. I finally made it to Giant Eagle last week. I once again filled the cart and managed to cover dinner for 3-4 weeks. I stocked up on cereal and a few other things too. I managed to save about $90 between sales, coupons and foodperks.

Monday the 28th I made a Beef Stew recipe that I found on a message board. It was a bad Monday and I forgot to get the meat out so I had to try to thaw it with enough time to get dinner cooked. I opted to buy a Sirloin Tip roast and cut it up instead of spending several dollars more for "stew meat".

I opted to deglaze with broth instead of red wine because I didn't want to open a whole bottle of it for such a small amount. Since I'm so new to this learning to cook thing I didn't even know what deglazing meant. I had to text message a friend of mine who is an awesome cook and ask her how to do that. Boy did I feel stupid. What I would do differently next time is to just put this all in the crockpot and cook it for several hours. I don't feel like the meat, potatoes or carrots were tender enough for my taste. I also prefer a thick beef stew and although this recipe was titled "Thick and Hearty Beef Stew" I didn't think it was thick enough. I wonder if I had left in the crockpot for a while if it would have thickened up.

Toss the beef and flour in a bowl until the beef is coated. Heat the olive oil in a large dutch oven over medium heat; add the beef and cook until nicely browned. Set aside.

Deglaze pot with red wine, scraping up the brown bits from the bottom of the pot. Pour in the beef broth and add in the beef, parsley, salt and pepper. Bring to a boil, then reduce the heat to low, cover and simmer 1 hour.

Tonight I made Mexican Chicken Lasagna which is a Pampered Chef recipe for the Deep Covered Baker which I think right now is my favorite product from PC. I tend to go back and forth on what my favorite is but right now I love this product.

This wasn't terribly hard to make but once again I was out of sorts all day and I think it took much longer than I expected it to because I was so disorganized.

I forgot to write down what size can of enchilada sauce I needed so I was a few ounces shy but I don't think it really made any difference one way or the other.

This was a huge hit and my hubby who usually adds hot sauce to everything he eats didn't feel the need to doctor this up.

Mine didn't look exactly like the picture above but it was yummy. My personal Pampered Chef consultants website info is on the picture so if you'd love to have a Deep Covered Baker of your own check out her site. I earned mine with hostess credits by having a party so that makes me love it even more.